Renee!!!! Today was a very bittersweet day for us, as it was Renee's last day as Samantha's physical therapist. We are so fortunate to have had Renee in our lives since shortly after Sammi was born. They bonded immediately (and trust me, Samantha doesn't take bonding lightly!), and though there were tough days here and there where Samantha didn't want to work, Renee was consistent, pushing Samantha to meet her goals through patience and persistence. She was always more physical with Sammi than I could ever be; tougher than the mama who would cave in when she felt the slightest little tug of resistance from baby. And she taught Steve, the primary care-giver, to be more persistent and physical with Sammi as well, taught him to be able to follow up on all of the exercises she worked on with her every week. And the results are obvious.I remember when we had our first home visit from our County service coordinator who asked us what we wanted Samantha to accomplish in her first year. I naiively said I wanted her to be walking by 12 months. She nodded and wrote it down, probably thinking I had a lot of learning to do, but she said nothing. Although I soon learned that my goal was a little unrealistic, I saw the progress Sammi made with Renee. It seemed like every week, the day after her PT appointments, Sammi would suddenly start to do something new, like sit up on her own, pull to stand, finger-feed. She took it all in, processed what she had learned, and began to practice on her own. It was amazing to watch. Samantha began walking at 21 months, ahead of the average age for children with Down syndrome. We are very proud, and know that Renee had such a huge impact on the process, both educating Samantha and educating us to ensure she reached her full potential.
Next week is the start of a whole new adventure: school. And thus, Renee will no longer be Samantha's therapist. But I like to think of it as the passing of the baton - we were so fortunate to have her in our lives, and now we can free her up to help another family and another child to reach his or her potential.
Thank you Renee.
My totally adorable baby brother, Josh (shown above with his girlfriend, Kate, last December in one of my favorite photos), left his home of South Jersey for the big city wilds of Chicago last week. He'll be starting his freshman year at 
believe) how to write and edit your own code to custom-make the backgrounds. I'm not sure what I would choose, but maybe some Oilily-patterned background.
e common on the extremities (which she has--click on the photo to the right for a scary view) and that it could have come from a swimming pool. We were at the Water Mine on Sunday--coincidence? I don't think so! The worst part of it has been that she is sleeping very, very lightly and fitfully, and that she just won't eat. We've tried everything, but I imagine that her throat must really hurt when trying to swallow food. Thank goodness for PediaSure. Good stuff! Oh, and ice cream. :-)
